Slit radiography has been known for many years as a technique for reducing the background noise which is generated by X-ray scatter during medical radiography. In the prior art, a first collimator, which typically includes a long, narrow slit, is disposed between an X-ray source and a patient undergoing examination. A second corresponding slit is disposed between the patient and an X-ray detector. Typically, the X-ray detector will comprise an X-ray sensitive phosphor screen, a sheet of X-ray film, or the input screen of an X-ray image intensifier tube. The slits in the two collimators are moved in synchronism. The first slit assures that only a small area of the patient is illuminated with X-rays at any time. The second slit assures that only radiation which travels on a direct path from the X-ray source reaches the detector. The slits move to scan an entire field of view on the patient.
Background noise in a radiography system arises from three principal sources: direct X-ray scatter, image intensifier glare, and off-focal radiation. Scatter is principally X-rays produced in the patient by the Compton effect but also includes some coherent (Rayleigh) scatter and some indirect photoelectric effect scatter. Scatter, together with photoelectric absorption, forms a conventional X-ray image by subtracting photons from a primary radiation beam at various points in the patient.
In systems which utilize an X-ray image intensifier, an X-ray image is converted into an intensified visible light image. The X-rays are first converted to lower energy photons in a scintillation layer at the input screen of the intensifier. The lower energy photons diffuse to a photocathode where they produce an electron image. The electrons are accelerated through an electron optical structure and strike a fluorescent output screen where they are converted into visible photons. Glare may be produced at each step: the X-rays may scatter in the input window and scintillation layer of the tube; the low energy photons may be scattered as they diffuse to the photocathode; the electron image can undergo aberrations which contribute to glare; and light produced in the fluorescent output screen can partially scatter or reflect before it is transmitted out of the intensifier.
X-ray radiation is usually produced in an X-ray tube as Bremsstrahulang or characteristic radiation from a beam of primary electrons which bombards a focal spot on a metal anode. The anode also elastically scatters some secondary electrons. The tube electron optics are generally not designed to focus secondary electrons and they usually strike the anode and generate X-rays far away from the focal spot of the primary electron beam. The tube thus comprises an extended source of radiation having a complicated configuration. Radiation from the focal spot can also be scattered by the output window and filter in the port of the X-ray tube to produce off-focal radition.